STATE OF FAMILY FUNCTIONING OF LONG-DISTANCE SAILORS OF DIFFERENT SOCIAL GROUPS AND LEVELS OF PSYCHO-SOCIAL STRESS

Abstract

The aim of the study was to investigate the relationship between the severity of family anxiety as an indicator of family functioning and the level of psychosocial stress (PS) in long-distance sailors, to determine further targets of personalized mental health measures for this contingent. Contingent and research methods. During 2016-2019, 110 officers of the command staff of the Maritime Merchant Navy, 90 sailors of the Maritime Merchant Fleet, 70 representatives of the command unit of the Maritime Passenger Fleet and 30 privates of the Maritime Passenger Fleet were surveyed. All were examined by men, citizens of Ukraine. The study included the use of clinical-psychopathological and psychodiagnostic methods. The study revealed differences in the manifestations of family guilt, family tension and family anxiety in the command staff and sailors of the merchant and passenger fleets. The greatest influence on the intensity of family anxiety was exerted by the level of PS: at low levels of stress the indicators of family anxiety (including its individual components) were the lowest, and at severe stress the indicators of family anxiety were the highest. The basis of «family anxiety», as a rule, was the poorly perceived insecurity of the sailor in some very important aspect of family life (for example, insecurity in the feelings of his wife to himself, or insecurity). Often such worries, contrary to self-image, were supplanted, which led to anxiety in family relationships. An important component of «family anxiety» was the feeling of helplessness and inability to interfere in the course of events in the family, in order to direct them in the desired direction. Sailors with «family anxiety» did not feel like a significant actor in the family (despite the real warming of an important position and active role in the family). The influence of social group (command staff or sailors) and the type of fleet (commercial or passenger) on the level of family anxiety, family guilt and family tensions was secondary. Keywords: long-distance sailors, psychosocial stress, family anxiety, family functioning.